


The Articulation of Grief

by fortheverses



Series: ParkPark - Islands in the Stream [2]
Category: Korean Actor RPF, RPF - Fandom, 花郞 | 화랑 | Hwarang (TV), 花郞 | 화랑 | Hwarang (TV) RPF
Genre: Islands in the Stream, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-17
Updated: 2021-03-17
Packaged: 2021-03-26 05:14:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30100851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fortheverses/pseuds/fortheverses
Summary: It makes Seojoon's loneliness seem less lonely when he thinks of telling Hyungsik how lonely he has been.Seojoon had expected this to be hard, but what he has lost was his island in the stream.What's left to do here now, but drown?
Relationships: Park Hyungsik/Park Seo Joon
Series: ParkPark - Islands in the Stream [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2180793
Comments: 15
Kudos: 1





	The Articulation of Grief

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thisbeautifullight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisbeautifullight/gifts).



Seojoon was six when his tabby cat Micky passed away. A natural death, of old age. He was told that there was nothing wrong with it.

Two days before her passing, Micky forgot Seojoon. He'd been intending to pet her when she lashed out at him, leaving a long scratch down his arm.

During her small funeral, Seojoon didn't cry. He pulled and picked at the scabbed over wound on his arm until it bled again.

Every time the wound started scabbing over, he pulled at it. Sooner and sooner he plucked at it, obsessively agitating the shallow gash, constantly picking at it...it did not scar.

It was under the moonlight streaming in through his bedroom window that he couldn't find the scar for the first time. It had been over a week since Micky's passing.

There was nothing left of her anymore, just...her things.

It rained all night.

On the morning of the next day, Seojoon's father found his six year old son lying prone under the cascading rain in their backyard, by Micky's grave, clutching her blanket to himself.

His fever lasted for over a week. His father always wagered that it must have been pneumonia.

Seojoon does not remember grieving Micky.  
He remembers the scar, remembers the smoothness of his skin under the moonlight, remembers...absence, remembers clutching at his shirt at the pain inside his chest and then...nothing.

He doesn't even remember fetching the blanket.

Seojoon does not remember grieving his father either.

He only remembers feeling hated. And hateful. It's all a blur of hatred, disgust, rage, guilt.

Regret.

He remembers regret like a punch to the gut.

He doesn't know if there's anything missing from his recollections of the aftermath of his father's death. There's no one to ask.

He wonders what Hyungsik may have done for him if he'd loved Seojoon back then.

What would Hyungsik have done?

It makes him smile inspite of himself.

Hyungsik is the most wonderful thing that has ever happened to Seojoon. He's the most unpredictable person Seojoon knows and yet the most reliable one. He's the only one who could've made a difference back then.

It makes Seojoon's loneliness seem less lonely when he thinks of telling Hyungsik how lonely he has been.

His life feels like a dark book kept in a dark room. He does not know how to read it. He doesn't think he has written it. He doesn't have the will to change it. Or burn it. But he knows his way around the dark room, he knows it well.

The lonely child in his heart is always scared. Seojoon's always ready.

But Hyungsik's been to the room too now, he has read a few pages and he's lit them up like radiation. The room looks different in his refracted light.

Seojoon does not know how to control himself.

He's petrified.

He's entirely in love with Hyungsik.

He's found true happiness.

He can always taste loss on the underside of his tongue.

Seojoon does not remember grieving.

Yet he's falling apart, for the last time.

He remembers the beat of Hyungsik's pulse on his left arm.

He remembers the little moan that Hyungsik breathes out when Seojoon lightly kisses the skin above his pelvic bone.

He remembers all the moles.

Every gasp.

Each pause.

His smell.

Goodbye.

Goodbye.

He enters his empty apartment and it reminds him of the dark room his life resembles. He slides down against the back of the door.

What should he do now? It feels like the world has come to a standstill for him.

Time will pass.

Nothing will matter.

He hopes he will forget again, one last time.

He knows that Hyungsik is the last loss for him to grieve.


End file.
